Fred Van Vleet took Auburn to third in the state, the second-highest finish of any NIC-10 team in more than a half-century.

He then played a key reserve role on Wichita State's Final Four team.

Now, as a sophomore, he's reached an even higher level, as the second-leading scorer on the No. 5 team in the nation.

Every week, either Van Vleet or the Shockers are reaching a new landmark. VanVleet came into Redbird Arena having set five career highs in his last six games, twice scoring 22 points, twice grabbing seven rebounds and once handing out 10 assists. Van Vleet was relatively quiet Wednesday, but this time his team made history with a 70-55 victory over Illinois State.

Wichita State passed 1906 Kansas and 1963 Cincinnati Wednesday to join Larry Bird's 33-1 Indiana State team as the only teams in the 106-year history of the Missouri Valley Conference to start 20-0.

"That's a pretty big accomplishment, knowing the other team that did it," Wichita guard Ron Baker said.

The Shockers haven't caught Bird's NCAA runner-up Sycamores yet, but they top anyone else in the Valley in the last 40 years. Consider: 1979 Indiana State and 2013 Wichita State are the only two Valley teams in the Final Four in that period; those two teams plus the 1981-82 Wichita team with Antoine Carr, Cliff Levingston and Xavier McDaniel (who later combined for 28,670 and 13,004 rebounds in the NBA), which was No. 2 for one week, are the only three Valley teams to crack the Top 5 in the Associated Press poll, and now Indiana State and Wichita are the only two to start 20-0.

Van Vleet (eight points, six assists, four rebounds Wednesday) also gets plenty of personal acclaim. He is second in the nation in assist-to-turnover ratio at 4.4 to 1, the highest ratio in the MVC in more than 13 years, he was MVC Player of the Week Jan. 6 and he came in leading the Shockers in scoring in league games (16.3 points). And his team's highlights are on ESPN as often as any team from the Big Ten.

"It makes me look like a genius with my commitment," Van Vleet said. "Now I can laugh at everybody who told me I was stupid for choosing them, but I didn't see it working out this way. I was just comfortable here, and now things have went my way.

"When guys stay loyal and do the right thing, things in life tend to go your way. That's what's happening now."

Page 2 of 2 - Marshall has stayed at Wichita despite setting a Valley record with 111 wins the previous four years.

"That's what I mean," Van Vleet said. "From all our guys down the list, everybody stayed loyal and stayed true and worked hard and put their head down. We're blue-collar guys and things have gone our way."

It didn't go the Shockers' way for 20 minutes Wednesday. Illinois State (11-8, 4-3) led virtually the entire first half, but shot an abysmal 1-for-25 from 3-point range. Also, the Shockers settled down and had only two second-half turnovers, after 11 in the first half.

"We we're so hyped up, we were trying to do too much and trying to win the game on one play," VanVleet said. "We just had to slow down and play our game."

It's hard not to get hyped when every Wichita State game has become an event. A crowd of 9,510 turned Redbird Arena into a sea of red.

"Everybody is filling the arena," Baker said. "It's something we've got to get used to. Everybody wants to come out and watch us."

"It's special," Van Vleet said. "When we go on the road, people are going to sellout to see us play, and we always have sellouts at home. But we can enjoy that after our career is over. Right now, we've got to keep locked in."

That's how history is made.

"We just prepare for each game as a single game," Van Vleet said. "You do that enough, and it will add up to 20 in a row."